An Exploration of the Carr Brook - Part 2

 

A sample of sandstone from Bowden Housteads Wood

Arriving at Hastilar Road South, having followed the course of the Carr Brook from its headwater and then taken a diversion to the church of St. Theresa, I continued downstream through Carbrook Ravine Nature Reserve but I didn’t seen any rock outcrops.

 

A view west down the escarpment to the Carr Brook

The east side of the brook is bounded by an escarpment of Pennine Middle Coal Measures Formation (PMCMF) sandstone, which I explored briefly before returning to the path that runs alongside the brook and then stopping at what I thought was an old mill pond; however, I have since discovered that this first appeared on the 1939 Ordnance Survey map as a swimming pool.

 

The old swimming pool

 

On my visit the previous summer, I turned right here and followed the path up a moderately steep slope where there were occasional patches of subsoil/bedrock exposed in a few eroded places on the path. This time, I carried on to investigate a small streamlet that appeared to form part of some kind of landscaping feature above the west side of the Carr Brook valley.

 

A streamlet and rock feature

Continuing past a pile of sandstone blocks, which I thought might mark the head of a spring, the streamlet continued up to a large shallow pond, which was frozen over at the time. At the far end of this, another large pile of bigger sandstone blocks caught my eye, which I then went to investigate.

 

A view of the pond on Manor Playing Fields

It is on the edge of an area that the LIDAR map shows as Manor Playing Fields, which has been obviously landscaped into wide terraces, but there is no sign of any natural drainage channel leading to the Carr Brook here.

 

Rocky landscaping at Manor Playing Fields

I didn’t stay around to examine any of the Coal Measures sandstone blocks used in its construction, but I thought that it was an interesting piece of landscaping and it reminded me of places like Padley Gorge and Wyming Brook – where large blocks of stone have tumbled down the head of the valley.

 

A view east towards the Carr Brook

Making my way back down to the Carr Brook, and following the very muddy path that runs alongside its west bank, I was dismayed to see that the streambed was littered with shopping trolleys, various bikes and miscellaneous other items of rubbish.

 

Miscellaneous rubbish along the streambed

Walking north along the path, which by now was becoming increasingly difficult to navigate, I eventually came to the point where the brook enters a culvert, where it is diverted under the extensive road junction of the A57 and the Sheffield Parkway.

 

The culvert on the Carr Brook

Finding no path that traverses this junction, I headed east up the escarpment formed by a minor PMCMF sandstone, where sections through the topsoil and sub-soil are exposed and with the mudstone having weathered into yellow clay.

 

An exposure of yellow clay

Over the years, walkers have worn away the soil horizon down to the bedrock and, beneath the yellow clay in its banks and littering the path, there are numerous small thin slabs of fine grained light brown sandstone, which have become detached from the main body of the rock.

 

A view down the escarpment to the Carr Brook

Collecting a piece of this for later examination, I continued along the path to the bridge over the A57, where I stopped to take a photograph of Wincobank Hill in the distance – with the Iron Age hillfort here occupying a ridge of Silkstone Rock that, with a dip of up to 30 degrees to the south-east, has the steepest beds in the Don Monocline.

 

A distant view of Wincobank Hill